Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Obama Extends Sanctions on Syria
[HT:DT]
President Obama issued a statement last week indicating that his administration would extend sanctions on Syria first imposed by President Bush in 2004. In extending the sanctions, Obama stated that Syria's actions
"in supporting terrorism, pursuing weapons of mass destruction and missile programs, and undermining U.S. and international efforts with respect to the stabilization and reconstruction of Iraq pose a continuing unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States."
The United States has consistently identified Syria as a leading state sponsor of terrorism, citing its support for the terrorist groups Hamas and Hizballah, its efforts to undermine Lebanon's sovereignty, and its suspected assassinations of Lebanese leaders.
READ MORE
Mosque is 'Muslim Factory for Jihad Fighters'
[HT:DT]
A Muslim cleric in the Gaza-based Hamas terrorist organization has redefined the purpose of the mosque, generally known around the world as the Islamic house of worship.
“Do you realize what the mosque is? It is a prime factory educating men to fear and please Allah; it is the prime factory for educating Jihad fighters,”
The point made by the cleric underscores the importance of security measures carried out by Israel Police on Fridays at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, especially during periods of tension, prior to Israeli national and Jewish holidays, or immediately following terror attacks.
READ MORE
Face of Defense: Small-town America Leads Marine to Big-time Success
All across the United States, from coast to coast and from border to border, you’ll find thousands of small, one-stoplight towns where livestock outnumber people. In these tiny towns -- just like Clarks Hill, S.C., population 376 -- your neighbors either are friends, family or both, and you usually never have to think twice about leaving your door unlocked at night.
Marine Corps Chief Warrant Officer 4 Rodney Freeman, a 40-year-old Clarks Hill native and chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear defense officer with 2nd Assault Amphibian Battalion, 2nd Marine Division, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force, credits his great-grandmother and being raised in small-town America for his success in the Marine Corps.
“My great-grandmother embedded in me some extremely valuable core traits,” Freeman said. “She instilled in me discipline, a good work ethic, caring for others and a sense of family and unity.”
Freeman, who’s been in the Marine Corps for 21 years, said being a Marine has been one of his wisest decisions, and that he has enjoyed his time in service.
“I’m not one of those guys who chase dollars,” Freeman said. “So right now, I’m looking to do my dream job of becoming a Junior ROTC teacher, which would give me the opportunity to mentor, lead, and hopefully help out some young men and women.”
READ MORE
.
China to create journo blacklist
Beijing - China plans to create a blacklist of journalists who break its reporting rules, state media reported on Friday, adding to an array of controls used to restrict its domestic media. (Snip) the agency that exercises control over the state-owned Chinese media plans to ''establish a database of media professionals with a bad record''. It said reporters who violate the rules or laws will have their press cards taken away.
READ MORE
The Dragon's Propaganda Threat
How Beijing is influencing talks on nuclear disarmament, gaining U.S. technological secrets, and leveraging overseas Chinese to serve the homeland.
A recent expert hearing proved a needed reminder that homeland security is about more than guarding against covert terrorist cells. A graver long-range enemy is funding larger operations and has penetrated deep into major American institutions, acquired U.S. technological secrets, and influences U.S. opinion-makers, as well as a large contingent of its own countrymen living overseas.
On April 30, the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission held a hearing on Chinese propaganda and influence campaigns around the world. As scholars testified, Beijing’s ambitions dwarf those of madmen hiding in caves, and the one party state is mounting a full court press to achieve its aims.
The Chinese Communists are promoting Chinese nationalism both at home and among the Overseas Chinese, while playing on the self-interest of foreign business leaders and the anti-nationalism of liberal intellectuals to further their rise at the expense of the United States and its allies... [snip]
The Communist Chinese lack the Islamist hijackers' faith, but both groups take the long view of history. They believe Beijing has a rightful role in world history and must displace the United States in order to fulfill it. As the experts proved, they are well aware of the tremendous foreign assets they possess, which may help them accomplish their goal...
[Longish, but Highly Recommended > ]
READ MORE
The Obscenity Blackout in MSM
The Supreme Court ruled on the case of ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox all suing the federal government for the right to drop F-bombs and S-bombs on young children. The Second Circuit had agreed with the networks that regulation of "fleeting" expletives was "arbitrary and capricious." There was great interest then. Both ABC and CBS put on full stories to discuss the issues. But last week, the Supreme Court overturned the lower court.
I bet you didn’t know that, and if you didn’t, it’s because the networks didn’t report it.
This is standard network MO: everything that supports their goals they’ll celebrate to the high heavens, and call it news. But when they lose, as they did last week, mum’s the word.
[the most prevalent spin... omission.]
READ MORE
Speed Traps Coming
CALIFORNIA
Flanked by City Council Pro Tem Wendy Greuel and Councilman Richard Alarcon, Krekorian presented AB766, the Safe Streets Bill, which would provide local communities greater control over the establishment of speed limits.
California's current "Speed Trap" law requires local authorities using radar/laser for speed limit enforcement to set the speed limits on those streets using the 85% rule, meaning that a speed zone survey is taken and the speed limit is set so that 85% of the motorists are considered to be driving legally.
Greuel called the "Speed Trap" law a thing of the past that "may have made sense decades ago" but that it now left the City with two bad choices, raise speed limits or stop using radar/laser for speed limit enforcement.
Alarcon put it simply saying "People drive too fast!"
[The Nanny State grows - with a profit motive to accelerate it.]
READ MORE
Then > 
"OPPOSE AB766"
CA Governor: http://gov.ca.gov/interact mailto:governor@governor.ca.gov
YOUR CA Legislators (Sen+Assy): http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/yourleg.html
or: Speed Message them with your personal distribution list...
and as always, pass it on...
.
Obama budget to slash 'stunning' waste in US
President Barack Obama vowed to slash 17 billion dollars in "stunning" government waste, as he showcased a 3.44-trillion-dollar budget at a time of historic deficits and economic crisis.
The White House trumpeted spending cuts in the bulky 1,300-page document, but Republicans warned the savings, amounting to less than half of one percent of the total outlay, were too small and would not ease growing US debt."The administration's proposed cuts, while welcome, don't go far enough, and they appear to be a diversionary tactic, an effort to change the subject away from the unprecedented debt this budget heaps on future generations,"
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecast recently that the budget deficit could hit 1.845 trillion dollars for the whole 2009 year, or 13.1 percent of the country's total economic output.
READ MORE
Global warming word games
Perhaps, before we 'fix' climate change, we should accurately define what it is.
In a recent New York Times article, cheekily titled "Seeking to Save the Planet, With a Thesaurus," John Broder notes environmentalists today prefer "climate change" to "global warming."
He quotes Robert Perkowitz, president and founder of ecoAmerica, a non-profit environmental marketing and messaging firm, explaining: "When you say 'global warming' a certain group of Americans think that's a code word for progressive liberals, gay marriage and other such issues."
"Climate change," Perkowitz says, is an easier sell.
One would think so, given there hasn't been any "global warming" since 1998 in that the Earth's average global temperature -- a pretty shaky concept to begin with -- hasn't gone up in the past decade.
Then again, "climate change" -- as it's used by politicians and environmentalists -- is also an inaccurate term.
The climate is always changing. It changed for billions of years before man arrived on Earth, so to use "climate change" when what is meant is "anthropogenic climate change" or "man-made climate change" is absurd.
Anthropogenic climate change is the change caused by man's burning of fossil fuels, as opposed to the natural emission of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere caused by, for example, erupting volcanoes, forest fires, all decomposing living matter and every one of us when we breathe out.
Then there's the issue of the word "change" in the phrase "climate change" because it begs the question -- "change" from what?
Fact is, we have no "natural" climate against which climate "change" or, more accurately, "anthropogenic climate change" can be measured... [snip]
Finally, my favourite, the "carbon offset" -- used by jet-setting politicians, environmentalists, UN delegates, movie stars, rock bands, professional athletes and other rich celebrities to claim all that flying and voracious energy consumption they're doing is "carbon neutral" because they're paying somebody else not to emit carbon dioxide in the future.
What would be the correct phrase describing carbon offsets, you ask?
That's easy: "Utter bulls--t."
Actually, I believe that's the technical term.
[Recommended > ]
READ MORE
Selling The Green Economy
Few things are more appealing in politics than something for nothing. As Congress begins considering anti-global-warming legislation, environmentalists hold out precisely that tantalizing prospect: We can conquer global warming at virtually no cost. Here's a typical claim, from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF):
"For about a dime a day [per person], we can solve climate change, invest in a clean energy future, and save billions in imported oil."
This sounds too good to be true, because it is.
About four-fifths of the world's and America's energy comes from fossil fuels -- oil, coal, natural gas. Re-engineering the world energy system is an almost impossible undertaking. Just consider America's energy needs in 2030, as estimated by the Energy Information Administration (EIA):
Compared with 2007, the United States is projected to have almost 25 percent more people (375 million), an economy about 70 percent larger ($20 trillion) and 27 percent more light-duty vehicles (294 million).
The selling of the green economy involves much economic make-believe...
READ MORE
California to dump ethanol?
Once again the Law of Unintended Consequences is catching up to liberal orthodoxy, revealing another dead-end in the search for an alternative to drilling here and drilling now. Among other flaws belatedly discovered with by the state's Enthusiastic Prius Association are:
- 1.) "ethanol yields about 30% less energy per gallon of gasoline, so miles per gallon in internal combustion engines drop significantly."
- 2.) Converting ground to corn growth damages the land and increases agricultural runoff.
- 3.) Burning ethanol increases global warming ( it "releases nitrous oxide as well as CO2, which is said to trap heat at a rate 300 times more than an equivalent amount of CO2.")
- 4.) Converting corn for food to corn for fuel raises food prices ("Higher use of ethanol accounted for up to 15% of the rise in food prices between April 2007 and April 2008.")
The sooner we start drilling for our own oil and resuming the development of nuclear energy the sooner the greenies and their elected proxies can quit tilting at windmills of fantasy alternative energies...
READ MORE
HOW SUCCESSFUL ARE CANADA'S DRUG POLICIES?
In "Cost Burden of Prescription Drug Spending in Canada and the United States: 2008 Edition," researchers compared average per-capita drug spending in Canada and the United States in order to determine whether Canada's prescription drug policies result in lower drug costs for Canadians. They found:
- In both 2006 and 2007, Canadians spent approximately 2.5 percent of their Personal Disposable Income (PDI) per capita on prescription drugs.
- Americans spent less than Canadians did in both years and averaged 2.2 percent of their after-tax income on prescription drugs in 2006 and 2.3 percent in 2007.
The researchers concluded that the Canadian government's intervention in the prescription drug market does not produce a lower drug cost burden for Canadians relative to the cost burden for Americans, who enjoy much freer markets.
[Another critical aspect to a freer market is the access to cutting edge or rare drugs, many of which the Canadian government simply bars on cost alone.]
READ MORE
The Profitable Nonprofit
Left-wing activists are indignant at obscene oil company profits, hefty CEO bonuses, and sweet golden parachutes -- but what about expansion of the No. 1 violator of human rights in the United States?
No, it's not Dick Cheney and the CIA. It's Planned Parenthood.
The abortion giant took home $85 million in "excess of revenue over expenses" (a nifty way of saying profits) and had an operating budget of over $1 billion for the 2007-2008 fiscal year, according to its latest annual report. Included in that budget was $350 million in "government grants and contracts" (an equally nifty way of saying your tax dollars)... [snip]
The first target should be Obama's executive order rescinding the Mexico City Policy, which had ensured that American taxpayer funds would never be used for overseas abortions. The move didn't get much ink because of the media's preoccupation with a dog, but it stands as an example of both Obama's abortion radicalism and intention, even in a troubled economy, to throw public money at groups that helped him get elected.
Maybe Obama views the abortion industry similarly to AGI -- too big to fail.
[I'm pro-early-choice - but I'm no longer pro Planned Parenthood; it's another taxpayer funded boondoggle that's part of the pervasive liberal indoctrination industry in this country.]
READ MORE
PBS Planning to Kick Out Stations That Broadcast 'Sectarian' Religious Programs
Here’s one sign that the zeitgeist in Barack Obama’s Washington is going to please the secular left.
On Saturday, Washington Post reporter Paul Farhi highlighted a policy shift brewing inside PBS: the PBS Board is going to vote in June on a committee’s recommendation that PBS strip the affiliation of any station that carries "sectarian" content.
Broadcast religious programming – like a Catholic Mass – and you’ll lose every PBS program from Sesame Street to the NewsHour.
Farhi reports that WHUT, based at Howard University in Washington, has already informed the Archdiocese of Washington it will cancel its "Mass for Shut-Ins" if the PBS Board approves the policy.
[The campaign against non-left free speech advances.]
READ MORE
Transparency in union finances a thing of the past
Ignoring their own rhetoric about the value of transparency and openness, the Obama administration is "rolling back rules requiring labor unions and their leaders to report information about their finances and compensation," according to this Washington Times report written by Jim McElhatton:The Labor Department noted in a recent disclosure that "it would not be a good use of resources" to bring enforcement actions against union officials who do not comply with conflict of interest reporting rules passed in 2007. Instead, union officials will now be allowed to file older, less detailed conflict reports.
Critics worry that the rollback of union reporting requirements will keep hidden potentially corrupt financial arrangements aimed at rooting out corruption, but unions say the Bush administration reporting rules were burdensome. How burdensome is a few clicks on a computer keyboard to generate the reports?
Seems like the unions investment in President Obama and a Democratic Congress has begun to pay off for them - at the expense of rules and regulations meant to ensure honesty and transparency.
READ MORE
Thomas & Totenberg Excuse Pelosi; Thomas Hopes 'Moderate' Will Save GOP from Limbaugh
.
Asked “why does it matter” what House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “knew or did not know” about the “enhanced interrogation” of terror suspects, Newsweek's Evan Thomas and NPR's Nina Totenberg failed to address Pelosi's hypocrisy in now condemning others for what she knew about years go, as both dismissed the relevance of her evolving memory.
Thomas, Editor at Large with Newsweek after stints as Assistant Managing Editor and Washington bureau chief, contended“Rush Limbaugh is good” for the Republican Party since he'll “take it down as low as it can go” so Republicans “make complete fools of themselves” and “then maybe,” Thomas yearned, “a moderate can come in and rescue them.”
[The campaign to convince the right that it needs move left continues en masse. Still, he's half right: the Republican party needs a savior - it just won't come from a 'moderate', that way lies doom {hence the avalanche of 'advice' by everyone on the left on the Republicans' 'problem'}]
READ MORE
Three Things Obama Could Learn from Thatcher
When Margaret Thatcher, then 53, appeared at the door of 10, Downing Street exactly 30 years ago today, hubris and self-doubt were not things that worried her.(Snip)Thatcher's true genius was her relentless focus on making policy in support of a remarkably prosaic goal:
to let middle-class folk feel that hard work would be rewarded in a better future for their children...
READ MORE
Washington State Bails Out Media: Newspapers Get Tax Cut
Isn't this marvelous?
Americans are struggling to keep their jobs and pay their bills; the White House and a Democrat-controlled Congress want to impose a carbon cap-and-trade scheme along with universal healthcare, both destined to dramatically raise taxes from current levels, and; struggling newspapers in Washington state are getting a 40 percent reduction in business taxes.
I guess preserving liberal media is much more important than the best interest of citizens as reported by the Seattle Times Tuesday...
[Amazing how when liberals want to help a company they don't hesitate to implement the obvious-well-proved tactic of tax cuts - but resist it for all else. {And then there's the question of why the want to save the old media...}].
READ MORE
Official English plan clears Oklahoma Senate panel
Legislation for a statewide vote on making English the official language of Oklahoma has cleared a Senate Committee. The vote was 9-6 Wednesday for the Republican-sponsored proposed constitutional amendment
READ MORE
Actress Angie Harmon's Favorite Website Is NewsBusters
How's this for a celebrity endorsement?
Model and actress Angie Harmon, who was part of a group of Hollywood celebrities that supported John McCain last year, loves NewsBusters.
In fact, she told In Style magazine that NB's her favorite website (from June 2009 edition via LexisNexis, no link available, h/t NBer Stacy Bergfeld)
READ MORE
>wow - that kind of intelligence in that kind of package... oops - was that out loud?<
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
